Clarke Varill/History
Clarke was introduced as having been strapped to a table and ready to be used as sacrifice by Lolth-worshiping drow cultists. He awakens to a group of strangers fighting the drow beside him, and helps the party dispatch of them. Clarke introduces himself as a famous author and offers to accompany the party, believing their adventures would make for good future writings. Him and Weesin join the group as its newest additions, and venture off to Navalia. There, he gets Memphis wasted by insisting she prove that she isn't a "square". In her drunken stupor, she learns that Sionis seeks the Wand of Orcus. The party travels to Vila in hopes of learning more about the wand at the Hall of Knowledge, and learn that it resides in the realm of Pandemonium. At Vila, Clarke gets into a scuffle with a shady dude at the back of a tavern, and later that night finds a note that reads "Zashir Torrun at Mages for Ages" stabbed into his headboard. During that night, Clarke is rendered sterile when Yamma kicks him in the fuckin' balls. It's also learned that Clarke sleeps completely naked, and spends his off time doodling extremely flattering depictions of himself. The next day, the party follows the note and take up a job to steal an elephant idol from a woman named Hama Shormwind. They track her down at a hotel where Clarke and Memphis search her room for the idol, but Hama ends up escaping with it. That night, Clarke wakes up to his throat being slit open and a note left behind that says "a job is a job". Memphis closes the wound and saves his life. The next morning we learn that Hama would be attending an art showcase at the Crystal Palace later in the day, and so the party prepares to finally finish the job there. While buying clothes for the event, Clarke has a short-cut dressed tailored for Memphis, and the elf is uncomfortably forced to wear it the whole night. Clarke swipes away the elephant idol during the showcase, stashes it in Yamma's bag, and he and the party make off into the night with their prize. "]] Clarke and the party venture down into the Underdark through a massive hole sitting in the middle of a goliath slave camp that was previously liberated in the party's former escapades. Clarke dubs the entrance "Memphis' Hole". On the way down, Clarke is relentlessly tormented by the cave-dwelling creatures below, ranging from being enveloped in a squid-creature to being stung by a small, flying monster. When Memphis is able to persuade Chris and Clive into letting the party accompany them to Eraney Keep, the two giants insist Clarke travel 60 feet behind them in fear of him stealing the goods from their cart. Upon meeting Duncan Varnash, Clarke is ready to kill the drow if need be; the party is unsure whether Duncan will tell them off to his superiors for having lied about their identities to get into Eraney Keep. In their mission to retrieve a piece of an illithid Elder Brain from Mind Gorge, Clarke agrees to be lowered down by rope into the vat that holds it to try and carve a piece of it out with his dagger. He does so successfully, and the party returns to Eraney Keep. In return for the Elder Brain, Clarke and his company are rewarded with a small wooden key from Asomak herself - the goddess that placed the Wand of Orcus in Pandemonium. "]] On the journey back up from the Underdark, Clarke helps the party defeat a giant purple worm. He tries to trick Havai into drinking from his water skin after pouring worm semen in it, but Weesin drinks it instead and vomits immediately upon doing so. The next night while on watch, Clarke attempts to connect with Havai. While the resulting conversation doesn't go well, Havai thanks Clarke in the morning for at least trying to get to know him. The party returns to the surface and journey back to Yamma's home village, where Clarke regales Yamma's mother with a colorful account of their recent journeys. Clarke and Memphis are the ones to sneak into Ferrum's orb tower after Mugen insists they investigate each city's respective towers and luminaries. Goliaths are being corralled inside the tower while the luminary, Doven Happet, hosts a large festivity attended by nobles. After investigating several rooms, Memphis and Clarke discover that the goliaths are being used as sacrifices to power something in preparation for an “ascension” of sorts, as written in Doven’s private correspondences. Memphis and Clarke decide to investigate more and find stairs leading down further below the tower. After disguising themselves as nobles and pretending to be part of the celebration, the two convince the guards to let the remainder of the party in under the guise of them being late guests. Clarke and the party discover that beneath the tower lies an expansive torture chamber that's used to kill goliaths in great numbers. They delve further into the dungeon, and eventually find Doven sitting atop a throne at the end of a dining hall. Clarke and Yamma are the first to enter the room, and upon stepping on a magical carpet, the two switch bodies. Clarke, piloting Yamma’s body, falls unconscious in the resulting fight. Doven lifts them up, announces that this is for revenge, and sinks her teeth into Clarke-Yamma’s neck. Clarke dies, but is revived by Yamma's body undergoing her Super Saiyan transformation. The party defeats Doven, and in the moment of Memphis' confusion at the body swap, Clarke boasts that he's the "real" Yamma and proceeds to shove his tongue down her throat. After clearing the dungeon, the party takes a woman named Alethra Nemetsk with them, who explains that she'd been trapped in the chamber and has been waiting for someone to rescue her. The mysterious woman offers anyone her company for the night when they bed down at an inn, and Clarke suggests she spend the night with Yamma-Clarke. That morning, the party finds Yamma-Clarke dead, with Alethra having killed her in the night. Despite heavy investigation, they meet a dead end in their search and come to terms with Yamma's fate. A grave is dug for her, and in a moment of genuine sorrow, Clarke tells the party he'd rather have died in the saiyan's place. The following night, Clarke decides to leave, wishing to find a way to restore his old body and bring Yamma back. Memphis, being the only one awake, bids farewell to Clarke with a poignant hug and parting words. The tiefling gives her a letter specifically addressed to her, and another letter written for the entire party. The letter reads as following: "These are the belongings I wish for you to either keep or donate to a publisher. If you see this woman, please tell her I love her ''drawn portrait of his ex-wife is included. ''Thank you for all being great friends. When you see me again, I'll have found a way to save Yamma. If you haven’t, I've died trying. I’m going to fix this.” Following Duncan's death at the hands of the lich-goblin in Pandemonium, Memphis casts Sending and messages Clarke. The two share updates with each other; since he left, Clarke has been tirelessly searching for a means of fixing things, but he's had no luck so far. When Memphis casts Sending again weeks later, she receives no response from Clarke. During his search, he was found and killed by Sionis' forces. After defeating Sionis, Memphis revives him and reverses the body switch through Greater Restoration. Havai rummages through the mountains of magical items in Sionis' domain, and he gifts Clarke a pouch of Dust of Sneezing and Coughing. After the story concludes, Clarke, Memphis, and Havai venture out to the islands off the mainland.